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Consumer Participation,
Tax Incentives Shape
Bush Health-Care Agenda

By

Mark Ingebretsen

Updated Jan. 23, 2004 12:01 a.m. ET

The health-care proposals mentioned in President Bush's Tuesday night State of the Union address were all based on a central administration theme that regular folks and their physicians -- not the medical establishment, or insurers, and especially not the government -- should play the predominant role in determining their care.

And the chief way to instill that sense of individual responsibility in patients at least is to encourage them to spend their own money. The hope is that when people put their own money to work to...